Understand Your True Identity addresses one of the fundamental problems behind people’s anxiety, depression, and relationship problems.Dr. Thompson, an experienced family physician, observed how many of his patients felt mixed up and confused, while others cruised through life with everything seemingly under control. What was it that caused the difference between these groups?Using real-life examples, Dr. Thompson explains the importance of underst...

In this unusual and much-needed reappraisal of Freud's clinical technique, M. Guy Thompson challenges the conventional notion that psychoanalysis promotes relief from suffering and replaces it with a more radical assertion, that psychoanalysis seeks to mend our relationship with the real that has been fractured by our avoidance of the same. Thompson suggests that, while avoiding reality may help to relieve our experience of suffering, this short-term solution inevitably leads to a split in...

A fascinating introductory volume, Existential Psychoanalysis: A Contemporary Introduction integrates existential philosophy with psychoanalysis, drawing on key theorists from both areas and expertly guiding the reader on how to incorporate these two disciplines, which may appear disparate on the surface, into their clinical and theoretical work.This unique and accessible book sees M. Guy Thompson explore key concepts, such as experience, authenticity, freedom, psychic cha...

In this remarkable review of the seminal contribution of the Scottish psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, R. D. Laing, the three authors, each intimately acquainted with the subject matter, explore Laing’s intellectual and clinical legacy.Written from the perspective of a psychoanalyst, a scientist, and a philosopher, this unique book thoroughly addresses the three principal themes that defined Laing’s work: his views about sanity and madness, the use of therapy with those suffering fr...

In this brilliant and revolutionary collection of 14 major essays that draw from more than 25 years of painstaking research, M. Guy Thompson regales us with a stunning revisioning of conventional psychoanalysis that deepens our understanding of the human condition.Integrating the most seminal existentialist philosophers, including Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Sartre, with the most forward-thinking psychoanalysts over the past century, including Freud, Laing, Bion, Winnicott, and Lacan...

The name R. D. Laing continues to be widely recognized by those in the psychotherapy community in the United States and Europe. Laing’s books are a testament to his breadth of interests, including the understanding of madness, alternatives to conventional psychiatric treatment, existential philosophy and therapy, family systems, cybernetics, mysticism, and poetry. He is most remembered for his devastating critique of psychiatric practices, his controversial rejection of the concept of ‘men...

A stunning exploration of the relation between desire and psychopathology, The Death of Desire is a unique synthesis of the work of Laing, Freud, Nietzsche, and Heidegger that renders their often difficult concepts brilliantly accessible to and usable by psychotherapists of all persuasions. In bridging a critical gap between phenomenology and psychoanalysis, M. Guy Thompson, one of the leading existential psychoanalysts of our time, firmly re-situates the unconscious – what Freud ...

This volume is the first concentrated effort to offer a philosophical critique of relational and intersubjective perspectives in contemporary psychoanalytic thought. The distinguished group of scholars and clinicians assembled here are largely preoccupied with tracing the theoretical underpinnings of relational psychoanalysis, its divergence from traditional psychoanalytic paradigms, implications for clinical reform and therapeutic practice, and its intersection with alternative psychoanal...

The emerging environmental justice movement has created greater awareness among scholars that communities from all over the world suffer from similar environmental inequalities. This volume takes up the challenge of linking the focussed campaigns and insights from African American campaigns for environmental justice with the perspectives of this global group of environmentally marginalized groups. The editorial team has drawn on Washington's work, on Paul Rosier's study of Native American ...

Utilizing the hermeneutics of Hans-Georg Gadamer and the ethics of Emmanuel Lévinas, The Suffering Stranger invigorates the conversation between psychoanalysis and philosophy, demonstrating how each is informed by the other and how both are strengthened in unison. Orange turns her critical (and clinical) eye toward five major psychoanalytic thinkers – Sándor Ferenczi, Frieda Fromm-Reichmann, D. W. Winnicott, Heinz Kohut, and Bernard Brandchaft – investigating the hermeneutic appro...

Ancients and moderns alike have constructed arguments and assessed theories on the basis of common sense and intuitive judgments. Yet, despite the important role intuitions play in philosophy, there has been little reflection on fundamental questions concerning the sort of data intuitions provide, how they are supposed to lead us to the truth, and why we should treat them as important. In addition, recent psychological research seems to pose serious challenges to traditional intuition-driv...

2013 Goethe Award Winner! This is the first book of its kind to offer a sustained critique of contemporary psychoanalytic thought favoring relational, postmodern, and intersubjective perspectives, which largely define American psychoanalysis today. Conundrums turns an eye toward the philosophical underpinnings of contemporary theory; its theoretical relation to traditional psychoanalytic thought; clinical implications for therapeutic practice; political and ethical ramifications o...